White Knight Husband: Chapter 5

By Friday night, I was honestly surprised that an entire swarm of Westwood minions wasn’t sniffing around just yet. I’d been convinced they would’ve shown up by now, clipboard-wielding, latte-clutching, overly polite emissaries sent to lure us into a false sense of security about being absorbed under the Westwood umbrella.

I’d braced for it, mentally prepared to swat them away like gnats, but so far, there had been nothing. An entire week had passed since that dinner and I hadn’t received any calls, texts, or surprise meetings.

They’d gone radio silent, and while that should’ve been a good thing, I didn’t know if I could trust it. It’d been crawling up my spine for the entire hour and a half of Pilates torture I’d just endured under the very cheerful dictatorship of a five-foot-tall brunette wearing bubble-gum pink like she was personally sponsored by the color.

My abs were on fire, my legs were jelly, and closing my locker took more strength than I thought I had left in me. I swung my gym bag over my shoulder and walked out into the snow with that jittery, unsettled feeling still lodged under my ribs.

At the corner liquor store, I grabbed a bottle of fifteen-dollar wine, the kind with a label trying too hard to look artisanal, and stepped back into the cold. Wind bit at my cheeks and snowflakes stung my eyes, but I stood at the curb anyway, waiting for my Uber.

When I checked my phone, I nearly shouted my frustration to deities I wasn’t even sure I believed in anymore. Twenty minutes away.

Of course. Fuck my life. Seriously. Just… fuck it.

I exhaled, watching my breath fog in the air as I cradled the wine to my chest like someone might actually want to steal it. A blacked-out, luxury sedan suddenly screeched to a stop beside me. It overshot, backed up with all the subtlety of a shark realizing it had missed its bite and then the passenger window rolled down.

Alex Westwood looked up at me from the comfort of his extremely fancy, probably extremely warm car. Although he didn’t look at me so much as he looked me up and down, those vivid green eyes moving slow and assessing, like he was deciding if I was a person or a problem he needed to solve.

Before I could process that he was actually here, he reached across his console and popped open the passenger door. “Get in.”

I blinked at him. Hard. “Are you stalking me?”

“It’s ten degrees out and you’re wearing tights. Just get in the fucking car.”

“I’m going to call the police.”

That gaze held mine, unwavering and completely resolute. “Be my guest. You’ll freeze to death before they get here.”

Infuriatingly, he wasn’t wrong. Snow swirled in tight circles around my legs and my fingers were already stiff even through my gloves. A quick glance at my phone told me the Uber was still twenty minutes away, and my spine was about to snap from shivering so hard.

My pride hated me for it, but I closed my eyes, dug deep in an attempt to stop my emotions from rioting, and slid into his car.

He must’ve realized my hands were full—and frozen—because he suddenly reached across me and swung the door shut. The heat of the interior hit me like a wall, the leather seats warm, and the cabin smelling faintly clean and spicy, a scent that did unhelpful things to my self-control—and undoubtedly belonged to him.

Buildings blurred past as he melted into traffic, the world narrowing into a funnel of snow and headlights. I mumbled my address and he nodded, his eyes forward and his jaw set.

A beat of silence passed, then two, but then I felt the heat of his gaze on the side of my face when he glanced over at me. “What’s a COO doing taking taxis and Ubers, and buying shitty, bottom-shelf wine on a Friday night?”

I turned my head slowly, giving him the full benefit of my are you serious right now? stare. “My finances are none of your fucking business.”

That stare had gotten me pretty far in life, scaring the crap out of rivals and titans of industry alike, but Alex just smirked, a knowing curve of his lips that was devastating in its precision. It ate me up and spat me back out again.

Unfortunately, Alex Westwood was exactly the type of man I would be into if I had the time or energy to even consider the male species. Confident. Daring. Half a head taller than me even when I was in heels.

He radiated a kind of controlled aggression I wasn’t used to in my world—a world of polish and money. Alex had both those things in spades, but this guy? He also had power, the kind born from knowing he could snap his fingers and doors would open, problems would dissolve, and people would just say yes.

He could get everything he wanted with just one, scolding look. That was a rare trait. The rest of them had to grovel. Most wealthy men carried insecurity like a hidden accessory.

I’d seen it. I’d negotiated with it. They overcompensated and performed, but mostly, they inevitably wound up groveling in one way or another.

Alex, however, had never groveled a day in his life. I was willing to bet anything on it, and to me, that made him dangerous. Because he’d still get what he wanted. I just wasn’t sure yet how he’d go about getting it.

A few minutes later, he cleared his throat. “You realize you could’ve been kidnapped.”

“That’s always a possibility when I leave the house.” I scoffed. “And it’s just called abduction when it’s an adult.”

His mouth twitched into something that might’ve been trying to be a smile. “Good to know.”

“To be clear, I only got in because it’s cold,” I snapped.

“Sure.” He paused for a moment, slowing as the traffic thickened into stop-and-go clusters of red brake lights. “You smell like patchouli.”

I didn’t even look at him, just staring at the string of lights against the snow outside. “I had my weekly séance tonight. The spirits said I would soon meet an annoying prick.”

Alex chuckled but his eyes stayed fixed on the cars ahead. He steered through traffic like the car was made of butter and the ice-covered road was a heated skillet. Smooth. Effortless. His big hands shifted over the wheel with an ease that made it hard to breathe and absolutely impossible not to imagine what else those hands could control with that same authority.

I needed to get out. Immediately. Preferably before I combusted or did something deranged like sigh into his shoulder.

Silence stretched between us for several long minutes, filled only by the hum of the engine and the rhythmic thwump of the wipers brushing snow aside.

“I don’t get you,” he said finally.

I let out a sharp exhale. “You don’t know me.”

“You’re mean.” He chuckled, clearly surprised, and shot me a glance like he was impressed, which only made the blush crawling up my neck even more infuriating. I stared straight ahead, determined to will it out of existence.

“I’m a woman in business,” I said crisply. “What you call mean is really just assertive.”

I braced for the laugh. The patronizing smile. The eye roll. Or worse, the classic, “Must be that time of month,” quip spoken by men who thought they were being clever, but none of that came.

Instead, he sighed and cursed under his breath. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

The unexpected response startled me enough to look at him. He tightened his grip on the steering wheel and ran his other hand in an almost absent motion through his hair, but something told me nothing this guy did was absent.

Absolutely every move was intentional. Calculated. Yet, he really did seem genuine right now. “What I meant was that I watched you make a grown man shit his pants in traffic two weeks ago. I know for a fact that if your mom and brother hadn’t been with you at that dinner at my dad’s place, you would’ve made Zach cry. Maybe Nate, too. You probably would’ve put my father into cardiac arrest.”

He paused, then shrugged. “And we’ve been… trained to do this. Since birth.”

“Do what?” I snorted before I could help it. “Ruin other people’s lives?”

“Your board is digging their own graves, Jane,” he said, his voice dropping into something heavier. How did he sound sexier, talking about business? “You know it. I know it. What I don’t understand is how you ended up COO of your father’s company when the CEO seat was open.”

The car stopped at a red light and I stared out the windshield at the swirling snow, swallowing the burn rising in my throat. Finally, I just shook my head. “Ask the board. You’ll have them by the balls within the week, anyway. They’ll tell you.”

“Will it be the truth?”

Holy mother of… he really is damn good at this. Picking me apart. Probing. Searching for cracks. Trying to find the spot where I’d break open and spill every ugly thing I’d kept locked down for years.

Too bad for him, it wasn’t going to work. No matter how good he was.

“Take a left here,” I said and he followed my directions, the brownstone coming into view at the end of the block.

Before he even had a chance to pull all the way up to the curb, I was unbuckling, snatching my bottle of wine, and launching myself out of the seat like the car was on fire. The door slammed shut behind me and I knew it was dramatic, but it’d also been necessary. I’d needed out of that damn car.

Of course, the universe wouldn’t let me have even one exit with dignity. My boot slipped on the first icy step and my free hand flew out. The wine wobbled dangerously as I caught myself with a muttered curse.

I regained my balance, mentally willed myself to stop vibrating from adrenaline left over after that encounter, and forced myself up the steps without looking back. Except, somehow, I could still feel him there, his engine idling and his headlights washing over the snow.

Probably watching me with those intent green eyes. He didn’t pull away until I’d unlocked the front door, practically fallen inside, and then shut it behind me.

It was only a few seconds after that when I heard the faint roll of tires on slush as he finally drove off. I leaned back against the door, my breath coming too fast and my heartbeat punching at my ribs. The wine bottle thudded lightly against my thigh as my hand shook, but then the silence closed in.

All the rage, the grief, and the old, rotting hurt I’d been suffocating under for years surged up at once, threatening to drag me under. I squeezed my eyes shut, wondering where this was suddenly coming from.

I was good at shoving this stuff down, pretending it’d never even affected me to begin with, but then I realized that Alex Westwood had gotten under my skin tonight—and the worst part was that I’d let him.

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